It's 5.05 and a good Tuesday morning to you. Welcome into the Carolina Journal News Hour on Charlotte's FM News Talk 107.9 FM. WBT, I'm Nick Craig. Good morning to you.
Well, today is primary election day. The calendar reads March the 3rd, 2026, and polls open statewide in less than two hours. They open at 6.30 this morning and are open until 7.30 tonight. Important to note that if you are in line at your polling place by 7.30 p.m., you are legally allowed to cast your ballot, even if voting continues past that time.
However, if you are even just one minute late and not in line by 7.30, you will be instructed by likely the chief judge or poll workers that you are not eligible to vote. Unlike early voting, and this is a major for individuals that have seen this. Over the last couple of weeks, where you could go and vote at any site in your county during that early voting period. Election day and primary election day does require voting in your assigned precinct. It's typically a school, a church, a rec center, community center, things of that location that are in and around where you live or your residential address is registered.
That location is based on your address, and the North Carolina State Board of Elections, their voter search tool, which you can find very easily by just Googling NCSBE voter search, will tell you exactly where you need to vote on Election Day. That'll be relevant not only for today, but likely relevant for November as well. North Carolina law does require that voters show a valid photo ID. That has now been the case for a couple of election cycles with acceptable forms of IDs, including North Carolina driver's licenses, state-issued ID cards, U.S. passports, military IDs, certain approved student or government employee IDs, and a county voter registration card, which are given out free by your local county board of election.
If you do not have your ID, you risk voting a provisional ballot that might not be counted.
So making sure that you've got one of those valid forms of identification with you if you are heading out today will be the most surefire way to make sure that there is not a protest of your ballot and you are able to vote. For voters registered as unaffiliated, which is now the largest voting block and remains the largest voting block in the state of North Carolina, you will choose which party's primary ballot you want to. You vote in, you get a choice of either the Republican or Democrat party ballot, not both. For those individuals, you'll have to choose. And selecting that party, again, has no impact on your registration status, but you will remain unaffiliated.
Voters who are registered as Republicans or Democrats, you will be required to vote in your respective parties primary.
So you will see that as well, depending on your party status. Your ballot will include, depending on what you choose, whether a Republican or Democrat race, a few races at the top of the ticket, including the North Carolina Senate race, including multiple, likely multiple local races and some statewide offices as well, judicial races, school boards, county commissions, things of that nature. You can also, on that same voter search tool I mentioned just a moment ago, it also will show you a copy of your sample ballot.
So you'll have an idea of who is On the ballot, how many contests you will be voting in? You can see all of that before you head out to vote today. Again, reminder: polls close at 7:30 tonight. Make sure you know your polling location, have a valid form of identification, and make sure you are there definitely before those doors close. As we have talked about, primary elections have very low turnout, meaning that individual votes can carry a greater significance of weight than we would likely be talking about in a general election.
We will take a look at what happened during the early voting period. Dr. Andy Jackson from the John Locke Foundation will join us coming up a little bit later on in the program to let us know how many votes were cast, what he is expecting as we run through the day today. We'll have a comprehensive coverage of all of the important races over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. Speaking of some of those important races, at the top of the ticket for both Republicans and Democrats is a Senate primary.
This is following the retirement announcement from Republican U.S. Senator Tom Tillis. With that, both parties quickly, obviously, individuals from those parties quickly got out. And you saw leading contenders in what is expected to be one of the most closely watched U.S. Senate races coming up in November in modern political history.
On the Republican side, former RNC and NCGOP chairman Michael Watley has a handed lead in our most recent Carolina Journal poll in comparison to some of the other candidates, including Don Brown, who has been running a lengthy campaign across the state of North Carolina. And on the Democrat side, you've know this name very well. Former two-term governor Roy Cooper is the frontrunner for the Democrats. Given the competitiveness of North Carolina in recent years, Recent federal elections and the narrow partisan balance that exists in the United States Senate. This race, as I mentioned, is likely to be one of the most hotly contested anywhere across the United States.
We'll be keeping an eye on what those margins look like for the winners on both the Republican and Democrat side tonight.
Some statewide races or some General Assembly races, I should say. One of the most consequential legislative primaries is taking place in Northern North Carolina, Senate District 26. That is Rockingham County, where longtime Senate leader Phil Berger, the longest serving in history, faces a challenge from the sheriff in Rockingham County, Sam Page. Berger has served as the Senate leader for more than a decade and has been a central figure in shaping the state during the time in which Republicans took control and have maintained control in the North Carolina General Assembly. Page, the longtime sheriff in Berger's county of Rockingham, has mounted a very competitive campaign.
It has forced a lot of money into that race and it has drawn some national attention, including an endorsement by President Donald Trump for Berger. And the outcome of that could have a major shift, should cause, or could cause, I should say, some. Major shifts within the North Carolina General Assembly. You will have folks across the state of North Carolina and the nation also watching the Senate District 26 primary coming up later on tonight. One of the other interesting races and contests takes us to Congress and Northeastern North Carolina, the first congressional districts as district.
As Republicans are seeking to nominate a challenger to Democrat, current sitting representative Don Davis with recent redistricting, making that district more competitive for Republicans. That happened during the General Assembly's long session back last year. You've got some pretty well-known candidates running in that, including Lori Buckout. She was the 2024 Republican nominee, ran against Don Davis when the Democrat was a little less friendly for Republicans and had a very good campaign night, ultimately losing to Davis, but mounting a pretty fierce opposition. Bobby Hoenig, who is a current member of the North Carolina General Assembly, he is a state senator.
He is in that primary as well. Carteret County Sheriff Asa Buck is also in the race as well. Those are the three frontrunners for that contest. We will be watching how that plays out tonight as well. And whoever it is is going to be looking at another race with a lot of money flowing into it, as that is set to be a key swing district for the midterm elections coming up in November.
In North Carolina's fourth congressional district, this is where the Democrat primary is likely to determine the next member of Congress due to the district's strong Democrat lead. Incumbent Representative Valerie Fouchy faces a primary challenge from a more progressive Durham County commissioner Anita Alma. The two previously faced off in the 2022 Democrat primary, where the current sitting congresswoman won. That rematch has drawn some major. Major interest from progressive organizations, including figures such as Bernie Sanders, who have been running television ads for the Durham County Commissioner in Missa Alma over the last couple of weeks.
That is an interesting one to watch on the Democrat side of the aisle. And then, of course, across some of our municipalities, keeping an eye on Mecklenburg County, the Democrat Party sheriff primary, we are keeping an eye on as well, as Gary McFadden has three challengers in that race. And in House District 106, Representative Carla Cunningham, who represents portions of Mecklenburg County, is facing a primary challenge. This, after she had voted with Republicans on a few veto overrides in the General Assembly's long session in 2025, Rodney Sadler is the individual who is seen as her most serious opponent in the primary, being backed by the Democrat machine here across the state of North Carolina.
So while there is not necessarily that much of Attention on primaries tonight. There are some key and major races that could have major impacts for both Democrats and Republicans as we continue to work through the year 2026. We'll keep you up to date with all of the details, all of the information throughout the day tonight. And we'll have it for you first thing here tomorrow morning, right here on the Carolina Journal News Hour. 23 minutes past the hour.
Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour in this primary election morning with some interesting news out of the North Carolina State Board of Election, who will be hosting a press conference around 11 o'clock today. We'll be tracking that over at CarolinaJournal.com. The state board has tapped Mount Olive native Ron Herring as their new director of election security and enforcement for the North Carolina State Board of Elections. That announcement coming out last week, and the hiring is effective immediately. State Board Executive Director Sam Hayes made the announcement last week saying, quote, Ron's impressive background and decades of experience stood out amongst the other candidates, and this appointment will further our mission of providing comprehensive election security for the people of North Carolina.
I am confident that Ron will bring a valuable knowledge to our existing investigations unit and further enhance the public trust in North Carolina's election security. As the director of election security and enforcement, Ron Herring will oversee investigative operations, support election security initiatives, and work with federal, state, and local partners to protect the integrity of North Carolina's elections. A graduate of South Wayne High School and the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, he brings some 29 years of experience leadership, advising, and directing complex law enforcement and security operations at the federal level to North Carolina. Most recently, he served in a senior leadership position for the Department of Justice's Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Force program, where he coordinated intelligence-driven operations, managed field office performance, and strengthened partnerships.
Partnerships across federal, state, and local agencies. He has also served as a supervisory criminal investigator within Homeland Security's investigation unit, leading major initiatives addressing drug trafficking, human trafficking, financial crimes, as well as immigration fraud. State Auditor Dave Bollick said in the press release, election security is an integral part of building and maintaining confidence in North Carolina's elections. Having professionals like Mr. Herring on the board as the director of election security and enforcement will go a long way in helping ensure it's easy to vote and hard to cheat in our elections.
That topic of election security has been an important issue in North Carolina over the last few years, with the North Carolina State Board of Elections recently approving a three-part plan to collect missing ID information or identification numbers. Of more than 195,000 voters on the voter rolls. Sam Hayes, the executive director, said he came up with the plan that would work to obtain driver's license numbers or the last four digits of Social Security numbers for registered North Carolina voters who either lack that in their voter registration record or did not provide it. As a result, that kicked off the named project known as the Registration Repair Project in July with the state board sending correspondence via mail and other sorts of advertising to these individuals to let them know that their registration, while not necessarily the fault of their own, is not complete and is in violation of federal law known as the Help America Vote Act or HAVA, which took effect all the way back in 2004.
So it's been on the books now for the better part of two decades. That was one of the major topics of discussions with the state. State Board of Election, which recently changed. It's a party and power with some new state laws. The appointment authority switched from the governor, who is currently a Democrat in Josh Stein, over to the state auditor in Dave Bollock, who is a Republican.
With that, one of the first issues that this new state board of elections had to deal with was a federal lawsuit by DOJ officials bringing the state and questioning the state's compliance with HAVA and nearly a quarter million voters missing the required information as laid out in state statute. That lawsuit fortunately is in the process of winding down as the state board and DOJ officials have determined that the state's plan, which includes, as I mentioned, sending out mail and requiring individuals. For example, if you are one of the 195,000 individuals that are on that list and are showing up to vote today, or you voted during the early voting period, you were asked by The check-in worker at the voting location to verify your driver's license number or the last four of your social. Without doing that, you will be required to vote in a provisional ballot, and there's a possibility that ballot may not count depending on what the reason is for that vote in a provisional or why that ballot is coming out and is being provisional. One of the other major issues taking place within the North Carolina State Board of Elections is the statewide election information management system known as SEEMS.
It was initially developed all the way back in 1998 and is a central election management system that coordinates statewide election, statewide elections, processes voter registrations, does things like voter roll list maintenance, as well as reporting of election results. It is used daily by not only the state board of elections, but by 100 county board of elections across the state of North Carolina and with a data system. That is now approaching 30 years old. State election officials announced just in the last couple of weeks that they are going to go through a major overhaul with that data system to not only make it more modernized, but to deal with some of the frustration and headaches that exist within the state board and local county board of elections using this system that, again, was developed all the way back in 1998.
So, in-person early voting, as I mentioned, opens this morning at 6, or excuse me, in-person primary voting. I should say opens this morning at 6:30 and polls close at 7:30 p.m. We'll talk about some of those early voting numbers and how that process played out over the last couple of weeks as early voting for the primary began all the way back on February, early February and wrapped up over the weekend on February the 28th. Dr. Andy Jackson from the John Locke Foundation joins us coming up here in just a couple of minutes.
minutes. It's 5:36. Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour, Charlotte's FM News Talk 107.9 FM. WBT, I'm Nick Craig. A good Tuesday morning to you.
It is primary election day across the state of North Carolina. We've been watching the early voting period, which wrapped up Saturday afternoon across the state. And to get walk us through what we found out during that period of time, it's my pleasure to welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour this morning, Dr. Andy Jackson from the John Locke Foundation. Andy, you've walked us through some of these numbers throughout this early voting period.
It is all said and done now. I guess some mail ballots may trickle in over the next, I guess those are due tonight as well.
So maybe we'll see some of those lingering numbers pop in. That early voting period is over. What are you seeing in the numbers?
Well, we're seeing that this was the most active early voting period in North Carolina history for a midterm primary, which is kind of what we expected. We've been having this trend of increasing turnout for early voting over time. The big question is, does this mean we're going to have more early, I mean, sorry, more voting overall, or is this just more early voting? Are we going to see a dip in the ballots that come in today on Election Day?
So that's a big open question that we have as far as turnout goes. I'm expecting it's a little of both. Right now, we're up over 100,000 more votes than at this point in 2022. I expect that it's going to probably be up slightly less than 100,000 because of the kind of natural trends that we have. But it's still turnout's up, and that's always a good thing for people that feel like they want to have.
There are votes counted in for candidates that want to feel like some legitimacy coming out of the primary process. A little more than 712,000 ballots cast during the early voting period. I will note that does include absentee by mail, so individuals that requested that and had to return them up to up until election day. About the same number of GOP ballots pulled as we saw in 2022, the last midterm primary.
However, Andy, there is a huge jump as it relates to Democrats compared to 2022. More than 416,000 Democrat ballots cast during that period of time. What do you make of that number?
Well, you know, that's actually kind of normal. One of the big drivers of turnouts is anger and worry. And right now, when you have a Republican in the White House, especially somebody who has been as controversial as President Trump in a lot of ways, that worry and that anger tends to be more present on the Democratic side. And this is really what we saw the last time around. About 58.5% of the ballots requested have been in the Democratic primary this time around, but it was 59% back in 2018, the last time we had a Trump midterm primary.
So this is in absolute numbers bigger, but as a percentage-wise, it's about what you would expect. Yeah, and we, of course, continuing to see that number play out. There are a couple of big Democrat primaries also taking place throughout the state of North Carolina. There's a congressional race up in the Durham area that's pretty interesting to watch.
Some interesting situations ongoing in Mecklenburg County, an interesting Democrat primary there for sheriff, and some interesting races on the Republican side as well. Senate leader Phil Berger's seat up on the Virginia border, the Congressional District 1, which is on the Virginia border up in the northeast half of the state.
So there are some interesting races on both sides that I guess drew some people out to vote. There are. That fourth district race, which is a repeat of the 2022 Democratic primary, is definitely drawn a lot of outside money. It's drawn a lot of interest. That one could end up going down to the wire.
Interestingly, the district that is leading voting across the state, because it seems to be drawing both sides, is the 11th district up in the mountains. We've got about 44,000 on the Democratic primary, about 35,000 on the Republican primary, which has incumbent Chuck Edwards against challenger Adam Smith.
So that could end up being an unexpectedly interesting night in the 11th district. There are several races where Democrats have been primaried, incumbent Democrat legislators have been primaried, backed by Governor Josh Stein. And so those have seen a big boost in turnout. A couple of those are in the Mecklenburg area with Carla Cunningham and And a couple of others.
So, yeah, there's a lot of interesting races out there, and they have been driving up turnout. Andy, we're talking about a pretty big number, a little over 712,000 votes during the early voting period. We'll see later tonight, hopefully before midnight, but it might be right around midnight when we get some of these unofficial election results in. But when we really break down this number, it's still a very low percentage of registered voters in North Carolina, correct? It is.
We're probably looking somewhere in the neighborhood of a total turnout of around 20%. It's a lot less than what you get in a general election where roughly two-thirds of voters are going to come out. Maybe slightly less since this is a midterm year. But yeah, primaries always have lower turnout. And if you're somebody who is an activist, who's somebody who really wants to influence policy, primaries are where the action is at because your vote essentially counts for more because you have fewer people to compete with.
Andy, I think we chatted before the early voting period. I think we did a little preview show back a couple of weeks ago, and you highlighted something pretty interesting that I want to ask you to opine on again. Because this is a primary within parties, that means that the parties themselves, both the Democrat and Republican parties, for the most part, are not involved. They don't have volunteers door knocking. In many cases, they're not manning the polls.
Does that add to this level of relatively low turnout in comparison to all of the registered voters across our state? It does. I mean, that's certainly one factor: you're not going to have the big party turnout machines trying to get people out. In fact, there's also the fact that, unlike the general election, we have a lot fewer contested races in primaries. You know, we just highlighted a few of the races where they are.
They do have competitive primaries, but there's a lot fewer competitive races. And so there are fewer candidates out there knocking on doors to try to get people out. And it just people perceive the stakes to be lower than in a general election where you're having that person with the D fighting that person with the R to win the spot.
So all of these things kind of combine together to make primary turnout a lot lower than what you see in the general election. Andy, switching gears a little bit, walk us through what folks are going to start seeing tonight. Polls close at 7:30, barring any sort of major technical issues, which could allow a polling location to stay open a little bit later. Those details will come out from the State Board of Elections throughout the day. Polls close at 7:30.
When do you expect to see results start pouring in?
Well, we'll start seeing some results right away, especially for early votes, for absentee votes. Those things will get counted. Probably within the first hour, we'll be getting those. Then you'll start trickling in the precincts. One thing that happened last time around is we had some change in the law about how ballots are reported, and that caused a little bit of confusion.
North Carolina is traditionally what we call a redshift state because Democrats tend to vote more.
Now, this isn't a factor in primaries, but the early voting would come out first, and then the precinct voting would come out later so that it would shift towards Republicans who traditionally voted more on Election Day. It's a little bit more of a mixed bag now because of the change in the counting rules. And so we're going to see some early votes and some male votes reported early. And then we're still going to see continuously some other early votes reported in as the precincts come in.
So it's a little bit less. Conventional, I guess, a little bit less. We can't really predict exactly where the votes are coming from, but they're going to trickle in. And North great thing about North Carolina is we report pretty early. We're not one of those states where you have to wait a couple of days.
Most of us are going to know the results of our races. By 11 o'clock. And certainly, if you're willing to make a night of it, by 2 or 3, you'll have pretty much every race called in the state, even the really close ones. For folks that will be looking at that, whether they're viewing that information on the State Board of Election website later tonight, or maybe they're seeing it on a local news website, Andy, most of those results are actually all of them, will say unofficial results. And that'll be the case for about the next two weeks, correct?
That is correct. We have the county canvas. And so the county canvas is the second Friday after election day, so nine days after the primary.
So we'll have this week, and then next week, the county boards of elections will get together and they'll make those votes official.
Now, We'll say it's unofficial, but if there is a significant difference between the unofficial result that gets reported on election night and the official result, that's going to be a problem. And that's going to show that there was a mistake in the process. These unofficial accounts are tallied through the machines. And if you've got a big difference, that means that there was a problem that took place. And that's our investigation to see where that happened.
So, generally speaking, there's some variation, and we saw that, for example, in the Supreme Court race where some of these late counting ballots flip the race in favor of Allison Riggs. But since then, there's been least to try to tighten that up so these counties actually have to get these unofficial tallies done earlier. And that should help fix some of that problem.
So, again, In most races, we're going to know who the winner is on election night. Andy, we'll catch up with you here in a couple of days. As we get closer to that process, you can walk us through some of those additional details. We will be keeping an eye on all of the election results across the state of North Carolina. Continued coverage later on tonight on our website, CarolinaJournal.com.
We appreciate the insight and information. This morning, Dr. Andy Jackson from the John Locke Foundation joins us on the Carolina Journal News Hour. Good morning again. It's 5:53.
Welcome back to the Carolina Journal News Hour, Charlotte's FM News Talk 107.9 FM. WBTS today is primary election day across North Carolina. Polls open statewide at 6:30 this morning, and they are open for 13 hours up until 7:30 tonight. It is important to note that you do have to show up at your voting location before 7:30. As long as you are in line, by the time that a poll worker steps out in line right at around 7:30, you are able to cast a ballot.
If you are even as late as one minute, you will be denied access to your voting location and you will not be able to vote. One very big different thing from what we've seen over the last couple of weeks: unlike the early voting period where you could go to any site in your county, Election Day does require you to report to your assigned precinct. That location is based. On your residential address, and the North Carolina State Board of Elections voter search tool has the information about where exactly you need to go on this election day. And it is noted if you show up to one of those early voting locations, which oftentimes are voting locations for individuals that live in and around those areas, you will be told you are in the wrong location.
So make sure you know where you're going. Typically, it is a church, school, community rec center, or other sort of building that is an election day voting location. All of that is available by making a quick Google search. Search for the NCSBE voter search tool. On there, you will see not only your voting location, but also a copy of your sample ballot.
Now here in North Carolina, voters are required to show a valid photo identification. Those acceptable forms of ID include a North Carolina driver's license, a state-issued ID card, a U.S. passport, military ID, certain approved student or government employee IDs, as well as a free or available voter registration ID card that is given out for free by the county board of elections. For those that do not have a valid form of identification, there is an exemption form you can fill out.
However, if you do have a valid form of ID and just forgot it, you are encouraged to go and get that to make sure that your ballot actually counts. For voters registered as unaffiliated, which remains the largest voting block in the state of North Carolina, you will choose which party's primary ballot you want to vote in. You will request either a Republican or Democrat ballot, but again, can only vote in one of those primaries. who are registered as Republicans or Democrats must vote in their own primary. There is no cross-party switching on Election Day.
So you will vote in that primary contest. And in that case, all of the votes or all of the candidates, I should say, will be Republicans or Democrats, depending on your election location, how many local races are taking place. We know that at the top of the ticket, there is a Senate primary for both Democrats and Republicans. That same voter search tool that I mentioned to figure out where your voting day location is also has a copy of a sample ballot, which is helpful to look at before you head in and vote today to see how long the ballot is and what contests you are eligible to vote in. Again, polls close at 7.30 tonight.
Make sure you know your voting location, have a valid form of photo identification, and are in line by 7.30 p.m. We will keep you up to date with all of the details throughout the evening. Over on our website, CarolinaJournal.com. And in a sleep-deprived Wednesday morning of the Carolina Journal News Hour, we will look at some of those races we highlighted earlier in the program, including the Republican U.S. Senate race, the 4th District, 4th Congressional District Republican primary, the 1st District Republican primary, Senate Districts 26, a couple of the races in Mecklenburg County as well.
We'll have a complete and total rundown of all of that coming up for you tomorrow morning right here on the Carolina Journal News Hour.
Well, that's gonna do it for a Tuesday edition. Make sure you get out and vote. WBT News is next, followed by Good Morning BT. We're back with you tomorrow morning, 5 to 6, right here on Charlotte's FM News Talk, 107.9 FM, WBT.
